Best Low Cost Diva Ripoff? or alternative?

NewYorkLion

NewYorkLion

Well-known member
Hey folks,

so, i picked up a long term gig and after two weeks of shooting they are starting to whinge at the costs i've been racking up with the rentals on the kinos i've been using. (i'm not going to lie, i've been marking them up considerably, but thats how it goes)

Anyway, they want me to lower my lighting costs and before i go and buy Divas, i was wondering about experiences you guys have had with the knockoff brands. I've heard good things about cool lights, but it seems they dont have any in stock.

any ideas? i'm way too busy for DIY, so that's out, and this is a situation where only daylight fixtures will do the trick, so i prefer flouros over hmis
 
We can always ship some of what we do have ready from China, but the shipping will be higher of course. We have access to some plastic models with lolipop on the back type thing which will be in our next product group in the fall. May be able to get you one fairly quickly. We just shipped a custom made 1200w HMI fresnel and electonic ballast combo today to another DVXUser who was in great need for a shoot in August. Let me know if I can help.
 
Richard.

I am in the same market as this guy.

I have decided to buy a kino 400 two light kit. I am renting one this weekend to make sure.

I have looked at your products. They seem great. You are obviously very responsive and helpful. After looking at your products, I got the impression the were mostly for studio work. I need something portable and durable. Here is my question:

Do you have something comparable to a diva400 two light kit? Lightweight with a case, stands, etc?

If so, how long would it take to ship? I am shooting second week in August.

Thanks, as always, for your contribution.

M
 
For how long it takes to ship, lets put it this way. We shipped today (Saturday--yes they work on Saturday here an consider it a normal day) and our fellow DVXUser should have it on Tuesday or so. About 4 days or so. Yes we have a 2 and a 4 light plastic fixture with lolipop. I can post a picture next week. We just went through one more revision and the next one should be good. I believe you would be happy with this. When you say Diva 400 I believe that is the 4 light version. The Diva 200 would be a 2 light version but we have equivalents of both. I'll know more about pricing on these units too next week. Stands we can do, a case may take a bit of improvisation but is not impossible. I would estimate shipping to be in the $150 to $200 per box range direct from China to your door and of course depends upon how many boxes as to what the total would be. For someone that wanted several things, air cargo would be the best way but you have to go pick it up at your local international airport. We can send you the bulbs direct from our warehouse in the USA and their free with all our fixtures in whichever choice of 3200K or 5600K you chose.

In fact, I believe we can start opening up shipping to other countries too now as we would want to be shipping direct to you from China anyway for the most economical and efficient method possible.
 
Great. Shipping is fast. For some reason I thought you had said somewhere it took months, via boat...

A couple of follow ups:

I am assuming that your fixtures don't dim. (Which is certainly reasonable given the enormous savings from a Kino)

If a bulb goes out or breaks, can I order a replacement from a common US vendor?

Do you have an estimation of photometrics on the units you are referring to? (I am not that familiar with the numbers, I just have been using the Kino numbers as a reference)

Here is the kino 400 and 200 numbers..


Photometrics-.gif

I just wanted to get an idea if I was in the same range.

Thanks again!
 
Shipping for our products to the USA for our warehouse stock takes around 25 days by sea and the manufacturing before that is anywhere from 30 to 50 days. That's probably what you were thinking about. But we've started to take orders now from people in other parts of the world and those in the USA that need stuff now and don't mind paying a bit more for shipping. We actually have some things we can ship now as well as some custom solutions like the 1200w hmi fresnel we just shipped. We will now be keeping some stock in China too for people in a lot of other countries and in some cases it will make a lot more sense to ship from here. For Europe, it may be about the same as from the USA or just a bit less.

With the new plastic portables you have your choice of dimming or non-dimming. We have some great dimming ballasts now that we found. The dimming models will average about $180 more than the non-dimming but these are not DMX, just manual dimming with a dial. The photometrics should be about the same as those models and most comparable flo models including our studio fixtures (the same ballasts/bulbs) but I haven't taken them yet. Yes you can use anyone's 55w tubes including kino flo. But ours are high CRI and just as good anyone's for video / digital use. No one has reported back to me yet about using them with actual film.
 
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do you have any pictures of the fixtures? also, would you be able to let me in on pricing?

-Colin
 
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I will have pictures next week of the 4 light model. 2 light model will be the same style. I know pricing on 4 light model now but will give 2 light next week when I post the pictures I'll have of the revised fixture.

4 light non-dimming $425
4 light dimming $599

All include 1 set of bulbs in either 3200K or 5600K -- your choice. Eggcrates are coming later and will be black 1/2" x 1/2" cell size and 1/2" deep with frame around them to protect and allow easy adapting to the fixtures.
 
Cool Lights said:
4 light non-dimming $425
4 light dimming $599
Click to expand...

Those prices seem really reasonable.

If I ship two of them, if I understand correctly, I should add $150 onto each fixture.

If I want two of them that is $1,500.

The Kino Diva400 two light kit is selling for 2,450 at a local retailer. It does come with stands, and a hard case for traveling.

(I just rented to Kino 400s today from a camera shop. I am going to light some test interviews tomorrow to see how i like them.)

If I add, say $250, for stands and a hard case on the cool lights it goes to $1,750.

I guess it will come down to deciding on things like brand name and resale value, etc. when I have to choose.

You do offer a great deal that is certainly worth considering. I could afford a whole other fixture with the savings. Three of yours for the price of two kinos.

Thanks for the info.. Look forward to the pictures.

M
 
Kino Diva's hold their value because of brand? I rarely see them go for over $600 used and sometimes less. That's about 50% to 60% of new value. As far as that goes, if you want a bargain why not just buy a used one:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Kino-Flo-Diva-L...oryZ3860QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Also, are you sure about that price for the 2 light kit including bulbs? This one is in the same price range and it does not include bulbs so that's extra:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Kino-Flo-Diva-L...oryZ3860QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem

Better check the fine print on that deal. That may be another $160 (or so) add-on surprise when you consider you need 8 bulbs. Also, don't forget you'll be paying sales tax from your local dealer.

If these dimming units were already in the states the deal would be $1200 + maybe $200 (is more likely what I would charge) for case and stands so that's $1400 or $1050 less than the Kino kit. If you take the non-dimming version (as many people have shown they don't care) then that's $850 + $200 - $1050 or $1400 less than the Kino kit. People that don't care about dimming can't get that option with a Diva. And I don't have fine print on the bulbs--they are included. Our models will have aluminum edge extrusions and a much harder lightweight plastic that will stand more punishment--therefore a major improvement on the Diva.

The extra shipping to get it now from China makes it much higher and could definitely make it cloudier for someone in the USA. People in other parts of the world will definitely feel its a good deal though as they aren't likely to pay $2450 for the equivalent kit in the UK and many other parts of the world anytime soon. One of my UK customers told me a single Diva 400 goes for $3200USD in London. That's outrageous. And shipping from China or from the USA really doesn't matter to them anyway--either way its going to be about the same to Europe and Australia/New Zealand will be much better as its closer to here.
 
That guy that told you a Diva 400 was $3200 USD in the UK was off... maybe he misunderstood cost and color temp... did he say the daylight version was $5600? :-)

In the UK a new Diva 400 runs about $1875 USD inc. VAT (still completely insane)... for budget shooters they have a company called Photon Beard that runs about half Kino $... but after all the necessary parts are considered I think you're offering the best deal.
 
Ah some lighting humor... We could use some around here sometimes.

Actually the customer told me it was $4000 then I recently posted about that on dvinfo.net and another guy said his quote was 1600 pounds which comes out to around $3200.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=90289

I have to admit it's hard to believe. $3200 is amazingly expensive but the truth is we don't really know what that means. It could be for the two light kit -- who knows...

We're just trying to help bring this stuff down to less than insane prices. I think you of all people will appreciate the dilemma in something that hasn't been driven into "commodity mode" yet. Which is what we're trying to do in fluorescent and hmi. For some reason these fixtures are taking a lot longer in the normal product cycles of moving from rare, common and then commodity where the price really drops. Similar to what has happened with PCs over the last twenty years. I think this reflects the fact though that the market for this kind of lighting is not really that big compared to some other products--like PCs for instance which have had years and millions of units sold to help "commoditize" it.

The studio fixtures made out of metal are easy and the techniques to put them together are well understood and easy to implement. It's when you get to some pieces of plastic with edge protection extrusions and gooseneck and with a nylon ball squeezed in a special cast aluminum clamp that you get out of commodity mode and it gets harder to manufacture them cost effectively. I have high hopes we can bring it down further at some point though in the future. We're already getting dimming down quite a bit with these new ballasts we're using.
 
Yeah... trust me I get it. They say the number one thing that kills a new company is lack of funds. I was trying to bring something like this into the zone you're talking about and I just couldn't afford it. Of course I did a few things that didn't help matters... like diamond plate aluminum enclosures that were TIG welded... when the shells cost me $30+ each it was tough enough... then the cost jumped to $60+ each and that did me in.

The coroplast shells of Kino have a lot of allure for me... I've taken a serious step back from projects like this for now though... for a one-man-band operation it's just a lot of risk to assume... especially considering that I was making nothing on mine.

The edge extrusions are a big deal... that's a tough nut to crack. If you look at the Kino Parabeam fixtures you can see the beauty in it though... you can get an extrusion that does everything you need... it can hold the accessories, give continuous points of attachment (self-tapping sheet metal screws)... and you have future-proof options... because each shell is simply cut to length and then you add end caps. The obvious downside is that a custom die and extrusion in America takes about 5,000 pounds order... at that point you are buying bulk aluminum that just happens to be in the extruded shape that you need. When I looked into it I found that it would take about $20K to get my idea balanced with a great low cost and an easy construction. As they say it takes money to make money.

Since you're in a great location to negotiate construction deals you should look at some existing products that would take little modification for video use. There are fixtures that hold flo-tubes and the fixture is designed for a track lighting system... they even come with a form of eggcrate in them. Here in the USA, because they're considered "designer lighting" they are high $ per each... "designer lighting" caters to people with money to spend... meaning a high-end salon, for example, has more $$$ to throw at a handful of lights then we do as videographers.

But anyway... that's where I would look for some of these solutions on lightweight housings that are very pleasing to the eye. All they would need is the stirrup and they're done... SOME of them even come with that already on!
 
Yes I imagine that welding must have used a lot of electricity kind of adding a hidden cost to the fixtures.

For our part we're working on two lines of fixtures now: the all-metal "studio models" and those will be made mostly of side aluminum extrusions with end caps as you described with the profile looking something like this:

fixtureextrusionnodimensions.jpg


It matches our current profile of stamped metal to keep the look the same. Yes, this is custom made and will cost us quite a bit but I think its a worthwhile investment to allow us to use aluminum and lower the weight of the metal models. We're lucky here because some places will let you get away with a smaller minimum order of 300 to 500 kilograms or so and the tooling cost is not so bad.

Then the new portable plastic models which are practically one big extrusion from one end to the other--including the reflectors. Here's a list of extrusions I'm using in the plastic one:

The body - an extruded corrugated ABS sheet material that's designed for use in building atrium roofing and is mostly sold as transparent or translucent. You can get it in Opaque black though which is what I'm using of course. We'll save the transparent model for later ;-). This stuff is corrugated like the other coroplast everyone knows but is super tough. Hit it with a hammer and the hammer bounces off. I guess made to allow hail to hit it and bounce off similarly. I won't say you can't dent it but its a little harder to do. The material is heat formed into a U shape to form the main body of the fixture which holds ballasts, reflector, etc. So this model is more like the classic studio type fixture rather than just a flat piece of plastic with 4 bend joints with gooseneck pipe. Ours only has 2 bend joints for the barndoors with the other bend being permanent and hiding the ballasts underneath the reflectors.

The edges - 4 kinds of custom anodized black edge protection extrusions 3 of them in aluminum and 1 kind in plastic. Yes you have to buy thousands of feet of this stuff for it to happen.

A silicone rubber sheet gasket extrusion seal between the barndoors and the fixture body. Looks really cool and was off-the-shelf. Kind of a corrugated look, is flexible, keeps the light from leaking out where the barndoors meet the fixture and also has the benefit of being a super slide-in adapter of sorts that can hold and grip the same eggcrate attachment that our studio models will use. Nicely fits into the aluminum channel extrusions along the long side of the body and barndoors so it's locked into place but very flexible.

Reflectors--polished aluminum extrusions. This one is really good. I found these somewhere already made. It's an extrusion channel that has a male interlock on one side and female interlock on the other so these things can fit together side by side in any number you like depending upon how many tubes your fixture will have. Looks like it was made for 55w tubes actually the way the parabola works with some sub channels for two tubes rather than just one. They're a little heavier than I like as they are about 3/32" thick but they provide strength to keep the plastic from breaking. You simply can't bend these reflectors at all they're so thick and strong. The reflector side is highly polished and just what you'd want: when lit, the entire front looks like one big bright output--so no dead spots in the reflector area. Very smooth. The sockets and bulb clips are attached directly to this reflector piece and lifts out to expose the ballasts underneath. There are two metal end caps to protect the ends and sockets. The switches and IEC plug adapter are on one of the end caps.

Then put a flat aluminum channel extrusion against the inside of the plastic back to attach the the ballasts too. This channel also provides the backing for the lolipop to attach to from the outside back of the unit.

In short, this may look something like a Kino, but it's better in all ways--not a copy or patent infringement but an improvement. The weight is very light, as light as you can get with 2 ballasts. I would estimate between 11 and 14 lbs for a 4x55 unit. That's about as light as you'll get.
 
I can appreciate that picture up there... that is EXACTLY what I was talking about... down to the anchor points for self-tapping sheet metal screws. That's it spot on. I'm sure whatever you have coming will certainly be impressive.
 
Yes I really appreciate it too as it represents a lot of thought about what's just right for something like this.

Even a slide-in adapter at the top for the barndoors or eggcrates. The guy drawing it for me didn't understand why I didn't want just a "boxy" piece.

We went for all the 90 degree angles to 1). match our existing studio fixtures; 2) because right angles give more strength to the piece 3). it looks more interesting; and 4). We've got to have that slide-in adapter at the top and a nice flat aluminum cover with airholes for easy access to the ballasts on the bottom end which just slides into the bottom thinner slide. Ballasts will mount to a couple of crossbars that go across the 2nd slide from the bottom and make it easy to change size for different ballast sizes by just sliding the bars back and forth closer or farther away from each other.

This is my 4th generation fixture so I've thought about it a lot.

Should have the pictures of the new plastic revised portable fixture very soon now. They sent it out already so it should be here tomorrow.
 
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Thread jack - Richard just wanted to let you know I have some interested buyers - actual outlets. As soon as youve got some things ready let me know. I need to purchase some demo stock.
 
As promised here are the photos of the new unit! Quite nice indeed. I took six shots. I don't have the stand adapter right now that attaches the lolipop to a long rod which has a baby 5/8" female adapter on the other end. So I took the shots on the floor.

The first shot showing the side without the switches and barndoors closed. Note the nice package, the edge protection extrusions and goosenecks. Folded up like this, it fits nicely under your arm.

pb1.jpg


The other side with the switches and IEC adapter for plug. Both dimming and non-dimming versions will work in any country without any other adaptation 110 to 270v 50/60hz. The dimming version will simply add a dimming knob near the switches.

pb2.jpg


Here you can see the special silicone gasket is attaching the eggcrates. Just snap it in and easily take it out. But the grip is tight enough you can turn it at all angles and the eggcrates don't fall out...

pb3.jpg


Here's a shot showing the 2G11 sockets and the special reflector extrusions. I love their effect. The light output is super bright and smooth. These 2G11 sockets are the same ones that all pro fixtures use and provide easy tube removal as well as a positive lock on the bulbs once they're in. You don't want a fixture without these. Just like the ones our studio models use. You can also get a better look at the silicone gasket in this shot...

pb4.jpg


The back of the unit showing the lolipop as it is now. The new stand adapter will be a simple unit that clamps onto that on the one end and snakes down with a bent rod to adapt to a baby stand or junior. The bend in the rod allows the unit to be over the stand so the center of gravity is where it should be rather than out front of the stand.

pb5.jpg


Here showing the unit with bulbs lit and high shutter speed so you can see the light output is quite smooth with the reflectors.

pb6.jpg



Let me know if you want to see any other photos or any angles I didn't think about and I'll post them.

As I said before, this is an improvement not a copy but you get great looks, a tougher unit, lightweight and even a non-dimming model for those that don't care--thus an economical price. Add the eggcrates, a good carrying case and the special stand adapters and this is a great portable kit. Actual light stands for these should be easy to find.
 
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ncje said:
Thread jack - Richard just wanted to let you know I have some interested buyers - actual outlets. As soon as youve got some things ready let me know. I need to purchase some demo stock.
Click to expand...

Noel,

Thanks and noted. I'll get back to you soon on that.
 
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